


Three Words

by FidgetyWriter



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-11 21:34:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5642755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FidgetyWriter/pseuds/FidgetyWriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Claire Mason had six years with her husband. He had sixty without her. And somehow Piper was there. Shown in nine moments in time</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Words

**Author's Note:**

> I was personally left a bit disappointed by the storyline with Shaun and the Sole Survivor's spouse--the resolution felt cheap and cliche to me. I changed my own canon a bit so my Sole Survivor's husband, Will, is the one abducted by the Institute and Shaun does not yet exist (except as a fetus which they don't know about when the bombs fall).

1\. "I love you," Will breathed in her ear by the lamppost next to her apartment as he walked her home from Concord at the end of their fifth or sixth date. With anyone else it would have felt too soon, too rushed but not with him. Claire supposed that meant this might be the real deal because she said the words back and she meant them. 

2\. "I'll love you always," he promised at their wedding three years later. When he said it nothing else mattered: not her missing father who had promised to be here two days and hadn't shown his face at all, not her mother's constant complaining about said absence, not even the news that both groom and best man were shipping out to Anchorage for war in less than three weeks. 

3\. "I love you," he told her, scooping the negative pregnancy test from her hand and pulling her into a hug. Claire didn't know if they were ready: they'd been waffling on the idea of parenthood for a few months now. But when she'd been late that month, hadn't the idea of maybe having a baby by next winter filled her with so much joy (and panic) she thought she would burst? 

4\. "I love you," he yelled over the rumble of the oncoming shock wave, and she thought his words burned brighter than the blinding flash of detonation. She had yelled it back, but it was lost in his shoulder as he pulled her into an embrace and the ground jolted beneath them. She became aware several heartbeats later that she was still alive as the cool, filtered air of Vault 111 rushed up to greet them. 

5\. "I love you," she sobbed in the ruins of their home while Codsworth hovered behind her. They'd taken Will: pulled him out of his cryo pod at gunpoint and marched him off and she didn't know where he was or how long it had been. She didn't even know who they were. All she remembered was the man with the scar down his face and his voice like gravel: "At least we have a backup.".

6\. "I'm sorry," the old man who was somehow Will sighed. "This has been my life for sixty years, Claire. I didn't know what happened to you...I thought you were dead. I mourned you and poured myself into my work." The sweeping view of the Institute laid out beneath them would have charmed anyone else, but it tasted like ashes in her mouth. "I will always love you, but I learned to live without you." 

7\. "How can I love you?" She whispered to the slightly bulging belly she hid beneath oversized shirts and armor so the Railroad wouldn't make her stop working. She wanted to love the life growing there, but this wasn't how any of this was supposed to happen. Her son's father had stared stony eyed at the ultrasound screen down in the Institute, and the words "you're having a boy," only caused a slight flicker of emotion across his wrinkled face. 

8\. "I love you. I still do," she wept as the evacuation alarm blared in her ears. The ninety year old tucked into his deathbed in front of her raised his hand to touch hers.   
"You have destroyed everything I've worked for in the name of freedom for synths," he sighed. "Get out of here."   
Piper pulled at her arm and begged, "Please, Blue, we have to go. I'm sorry I'm so sorry."   
Claire let herself be pulled toward the door. She couldn't hear him over the alarm, but she saw him mouth the words: "But I love you both too." 

1\. "I love you, little one," she coos to baby Shaun who reaches up and pulls gently on her hair as she feeds him early in the morning. She had doubted for so long, but not for a second once he had arrived.   
Piper shuffles across the floor and hands over an old coffee mug filled with some warm tea. Claire sets the mug down and grabs Piper's hand.   
"And you. I love you more than air."


End file.
